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HELSINKI (AP) -- Microsoft is wagering $7.2 billion on the idea that owning Nokia's phone business will help the software giant grab a bigger slice of the mobile computing market from Apple and Google.
The Windows maker is buying Nokia Corp.'s line-up of smartphones and a portfolio of patents and services. The$7.2 billion deal, announced late Monday, marks a major step in the company's push to transform itself from a software maker focused on desktop and laptop computers into a more versatile and nimble company that delivers services on any kind of Internet-connected gadget.
Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer gives his presentation at the launch of Microsoft Windows 8, in New York, Thursday, Oct. 25, 2012. (AP)
But some analysts questioned whether buying up the mobile business of Nokia, the fading star of the cellphone world, would aid Microsoft.
"Until there are signs that (Microsoft) can innovate and successfully execute in the post-PC era, we expect the stock to languish at current levels," said Janney analysts Yun Kim and Alice Hur. "We do not believe the planned acquisition of (Nokia's) mobile business changes (Microsoft's) strategic positioning in the smartphone market."
Microsoft's shares fell $1.64, or 4.9 percent, to $31.76 in afternoon trading in the U.S. on Tuesday.
Microsoft, based in Redmond, Wash., has been racing to catch up with customers who are increasingly pursuing their digital lives on smartphones and tablet computers rather than traditional PCs. The shift is weakening Microsoft, which has dominated the PC software market for the past 30 years, and empowering Apple Inc., the maker of the trend-setting iPhone and iPad, and Google Inc., which gives away the world's most popular mobile operating system, Android.
Microsoft is now betting it will have a better chance of narrowing the gap with its rivals if it seizes complete control over how mobile devices work with its Windows software.
"It's a bold step into the future - a win-win for employees, shareholders and consumers of both companies," Microsoft CEO Steven Ballmer told reporters at Nokia's headquarters in Finland Tuesday. "It's a signature event."
But speaking to investors and analysts later Tuesday, Ballmer admitted that the company still has to play catch-up with the likes of Apple and Android.
"We know we need to accelerate. We're not confused about that," he said.
"We need to be a company that provides a family of devices."
Nokia, based in Espoo, near the Finnish capital, and Microsoft have been trying to make inroads in the smartphone market as part of a partnership forged in 2011. Under the alliance, Nokia's Lumia smartphones have run on Microsoft's Windows software, but those devices haven't managed to compete with iPhone or the array of Android-powered devices spearheaded by Samsung Electronics' smartphones and tablets.
Terry Myerson, Microsoft Executive Vice-President of Operating Systems, admitted on a call to investors Tuesday that the message about company's products hasn't been getting through to consumers and that "marketing approaches we've used in the past have been inefficient."
The acquisition is being made at the same time that Microsoft is looking for a new leader. Just 10 days ago, Ballmer, 57, announced he will step down as CEO within the next year.
Stephen Elop, who left Microsoft in 2010 to become Nokia CEO, will step down as president and CEO of the company to become executive vice president of Nokia devices and services and will rejoin Microsoft once the acquisition closes.
The deal has fueled speculation that Elop, a former Microsoft executive, will emerge as a top candidate to succeed Ballmer.
Nokia board chairman Risto Siilasmaa told reporters that they had been preparing the deal since February. "It's been an extremely pragmatic and deeply analytical process where we have left no stone unturned to understand all the possible alternatives for the company going forward," said Siilasmaa, who will be Nokia's interim CEO.
Investors in Nokia welcomed the deal, sending shares in the company up 34 percent to 3.97 euros in Helsinki.
Microsoft hopes to complete the deal early next year. If that timetable pans out, about 32,000 Nokia employees will transfer to Microsoft, which currently has about 99,000 workers.
The proposed price consists of 3.79 billion euros ($5 billion) for the Nokia unit that makes mobile phones, including its line of Lumia smartphones that run Windows Phone software. Another 1.65 billion euros ($2.2 billion) will be paid for a 10-year license to use Nokia's patents, with the option to extend it indefinitely. Ballmer said that Microsoft will invest more than $250 million in a new data center to serve European consumers.
Nokia CFO Timo Ihamuotila said the company's future will center on its mobile networks business and two smaller units - HERE mapping services and the advanced technologies unit including Nokia's licensing business.
"Our aim is clearly to grow the networks business in a profitable way," he said in a call to investors. "It is a cash-generating business where we can invest into the future growth."
Nokia will continue to own the rights to its brand, but the deal between the two companies prevents it from venturing into a separate smartphone business until the end of 2015.
Neil Mawston from Strategy Analytics said the move was good for Nokia's shareholders but did not change much for the ailing Finnish firm, which has lost significant market share.
"Nokia is still heavily dependent on Microsoft's software capabilities and Microsoft continues to lag the market like it has done in the last few years," Mawston said. "Not much will change whether Nokia is inside or outside the Microsoft portfolio."
The deal with Nokia represents the second most expensive acquisition in Microsoft's 38-year history, ranking behind an $8.5 billion purchase of Internet calling and video conferencing service Skype. Tony Bates, who ran Skype, is also regarded as a potential successor to Ballmer.
The money to buy Nokia's smartphones and patents will be drawn from the nearly $70 billion that Microsoft held in overseas accounts as of June 30.
Michelle Chapman in New York and Jari Tanner in Tallinn, Estonia, contributed to this article.


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Where fantasy and reality collide: In 'Second Life,' there's no escaping real-life issues and feelings
The war against sexual predators has moved to a new frontier: An online fantasy world where some fantasies are no longer welcome.
Second Life is what's known in the online gaming field as a ``Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game.'' But it's more a virtual world than a computer game. There are no points to score or levels to conquer. It's a place where players can do pretty much whatever they want.
What they want begins with the activities that have drawn people to the Internet from the beginning: gambling, shopping and sex. But those who hang around do much more than that. They play with in-world toys, such as cars, planes, boats and guns. They buy land on SL's growing islands and continents. They build homes, businesses and organizations.
They also build relationships, which is one area where fantasy and reality overlap. Players become friends, business partners and sometimes former friends and ex-business partners. They date, get engaged and sometimes marry.
As Second Life grows - it now has 7.9 million official residents, with some 30,000 to 40,000 "in-world'' at any given time - so does its overlap with reality. Hip real-world companies now have stores in Second Life, with links to their Web sites. John Edwards and Hillary Clinton, among others, have campaign outposts in Second Life.
The ACLU held a rally in Washington this week to protest torture and the erosion of constitutional rights - with a simultaneous rally in Second Life for those unable to attend the real one. There are live concerts in Second Life by real performers, the sound carried by Internet radio.
One player I met told me in real life - RL, in SL lingo - he works in technology at an Arizona university. His department holds meetings and training sessions in Second Life, where they gather around a virtual conference table and watch video presentations.
Residents of Second Life move through the world as avatars - AVs, for short - a Sanskrit word for a Hindu deity that has been adapted to describe a digital representation of a person in a virtual environment. AVs are fully customizable, with thousands of possible combinations of bodies, faces and clothing. Dressing up your avatar is a popular avocation, an electronic version of playing with paper dolls.
With all those options though, it's not surprising that most AVs are young, attractive and buff. If you could choose a body to represent you, wouldn't you want it to be beautiful? The AVs look cartoonish, though you can buy "skins'' that make your AV look more realistic, but they aren't static. When you aren't moving them, they fidget, look around, shift their weight from foot to foot.
It's in choosing an avatar that the reality and fantasy get slippery. Some players work hard to make their AVs look like their real life selves. They make no effort to hide who they really are. One pointed me to his MySpace page so I could see his real pictures.
For most, though, the avatar is closer to how they wish they looked, or the character they feel like playing. Some choose to be vampires, or hulking warriors, or medieval wizards. Some wear wings or devil's tails. Some dress as creatures from another galaxy.
Then there are the "furries'' - avatars that are small, cuddly things. Furries, which come in various species, ages and sexual orientations, have created a strong sub-culture in Second Life. Yes, it's weird, even surreal: The other day I saw someone who had chosen to be an ice-cold pitcher of Kool-Aid. But diversity is a Second Life value that goes far beyond skin color.
Avatars can walk, but they can also fly. They can teleport from location to location. They build castles and elaborate treehouses, churches and fantastical sculptures. Someone built a small model of Boston on a beach; another built a replica of the Sistine Chapel. It's amazing what you can build when you aren't bound by the laws of physics.
They make money, too. Second Life has its own currency - Linden dollars - which can be exchanged for real cash (1,000 Linden dollars goes for about $4 in the current exchange rate). Here, too, reality and fantasy overlap. There are stories of residents who have made enough in SL to quit their RL jobs. One AV I spoke to had been threatened with banishment when he was caught buying Linden dollars on eBay.
The avatars move stiffly, but if you click on the right spot, SL will "animate your avatar'' so it can climb, surf or do a swan dive. You and an AV friend can tango like stars or - if you click on the right spot in a mature area - have sex in more positions than you can count.
Second Life is more than games. An avatar is a digital puppet, and there's a human puppeteer behind it. So you - or your AV, that is - can be sitting at a club next to a goth or a vixen or a raccoon, and pretty soon you find out that, in RL, he's a professor in Brussels or a farmer in Boise or an artist in Beijing. Before you know it, you're talking about the Red Sox, or comparing notes on favorite restaurants, or debating global politics.
You can't help but associate the person with the avatar, but you may be way off. The avatar may be a buxom young blonde, while the person behind it is a 60-year-old man.
"You can go cross-gender, cross-species, or even cross-planet,'' an experienced AV tells me.
"Sure, a lot in SL is fake,'' he says, "but the feelings that can be generated can be very real.'' The program can make your avatar dance, but once you start chatting with another resident, you're on your own. You can be charmed or lied to, find the sympathetic ear you've been looking for or get to know someone on the other side of the world you wish you could invite over for coffee.
And sometimes a cartoon avatar can break a human heart. "Been there, done that, got the T-shirt,'' an AV tells me.
What draws people to Second Life, another explains, is the ability to be somebody you can't be in real life, to try something you could never do at home: To be a merchant or a builder, a wizard or a warrior, a superhero or a slut.
Or just to move around, meet people and make friends. "You'd be surprised how many people here are invalids in real life, stuck in their beds and unable to do any of this stuff,'' one AV told me.
For them, and many others, Second Life offers a kind of fantasy therapy.
But for the Lindens - employees of Linden Lab, which owns Second Life - some fantasies are bad for business.
Just as there are adults who choose to present themselves as wolves or warriors, there are adults who come to SL as children. Underage players - Linden Lab is working on an age-verification system to keep kids out, but it's not operational yet - would rather pose as grownups, an experienced AV tells me. The adults pose as children mostly because they crave innocence.
Some apparently crave sex as well, and engage in what they call "age-play'' in mature areas. Such depictions may not violate U.S. child pornography laws, but European laws are more broadly written, and there is a threat of civil litigation. Second Life is a business, after all, and the Lindens worry that bad publicity could drive off customers. In May, "Daniel Linden'' announced in the official SL blog that depictions or avatar portrayals involving sex and minors were prohibited, along with depictions of sexual violence and "other broadly offensive content.''
The free spirits in SL have objected loudly about "thought police'' and pointed out the hypocrisy of imposing such policies in a place where large areas are devoted to combat and kinky sex. Second Life, which advertises itself as "a digital world imagined, created and owned by its residents,'' must not be turned into a dictatorship, they say.
The new policy was tested this week at "Second Pride,'' SL's celebration of gay, lesbian, transgender and other alternate lifestyles. The Pride Committee decreed that child avatars would be treated as the ages they represent, not their RL age, that they would be kept out of areas rated mature, and that they had to be accompanied by parent/guardian AVs.
But a lot of child AVs don't have parent AVs. When a small group of child AVs showed up at the Pride amusement park on opening day, they were evicted - and very disappointed.
"It's only an avatar,'' I heard one say. "I'm really 38.''
Are the child AVs, or those who play with them, sexual predators in RL? Maybe some are. Should they be persecuted in SL, or might they benefit from the fantasy therapy SL offers? Beats me.
But as crazy as all this seems to those of us who are strangers in virtual worlds like Second Life, World of Warcraft, Everquest and a growing list of similar games, this confusing mix of reality and unreality isn't going away. Mitch Kapor, the high-tech visionary who dreamed up Lotus in Cambridge back in the '80s, is chairman of Linden Labs. He predicts that in the years to come, virtual worlds will be as central to the wired world as the World Wide Web is today.
For young people, it will feel like second nature to live in a virtual world like Second Life. We older folks may be confused by the shape-shifting and fantasy/reality traps. But at least our avatars will look young and hip.
Rick Holmes is opinion editor for the MetroWest Daily News. He can be reached by e-mail at firstname.lastname@example.com.


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This is a game I play on one polish forum, and I thought it would be fun to play it here. It's easy, really, yet a good brain exercise.....
The Rules: One person says a word. ANY word. Another person writes down what does the word remind of. Then another person writes a connotation of the second persons word et caetera.
In Examplum:
A: SP-Studio.
B: South Park.
C: Kenny.
D: Death.
and so on....
Of course, you can ( And should ) explain why does the previous word remind you of your word.
I'll start with word:


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Health Leadership Team kicks off
The Siskiyou County Department of Public Health Services and Community Development says it's getting serious about combating the problems of poor health and obesity and their Health Leadership Group is a way to bring the skills and influence of community-minded county residents into the effort.
On Tuesday, the public health department convened its first meeting of the leadership group to introduce them to some past and current efforts, invite input for future projects and provide some information about the current obesity epidemic in the United States.
The meeting began with county health officer Dr. Stephen Perlman providing data on obesity in the U.S. He said that a clear and dramatic increase in obesity rates across the country began to occur around the early 1980s, though it is the result of more than 100 years of changes in modern food systems and a long-term trend toward a more sedentary lifestyle. According to data he presented, the majority of healthcare in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century was focused on infectious disease but in the past several decades a clear change has shifted the majority (80 percent) to a focus on chronic diseases such as cancer, diabetes and heart disease – ailments closely linked to factors of our environment and lifestyle. This shift, he said, reflects the change in public health trends.
In 1970 the U.S. spent $75 billion on healthcare. By 2004 that number had soared to $1.9 trillion and continues to climb. Obesity, Perlman said, is one of the biggest contributing factors in many of the chronic diseases that have driven that growth in spending.
Siskiyou County is no exception to the national trend. Perlman showed a series of slides highlighting Siskiyou County's statewide ranking in a number of health categories. Out of 58 counties in the state, Siskiyou ranks near the bottom for overall health outcomes at number 54. Siskiyou County ranked in last place for its per capita rate of colorectal cancer, and placed in the worst 10 counties for lung and prostate cancers, while ranking at number 44 for breast cancer. We rank at number 57 for deaths by liver disease/cirrhosis and number 41 for deaths from diabetes, which is closely related to obesity.
Perlman said there are three levels of intervention that need to be addressed in a comprehensive approach to changing these statistics. They are chronic disease management, individual risk factor reduction and environmental influences (both physical and social).
After viewing a 20-minute clip of a movie titled "The Weight of the Nation" about the obesity epidemic, the group heard from Daniele Minock, tobacco program coordinator for the public health department.
Minock said much of the county's upcoming efforts to combat obesity and other chronic disease will focus on prevention techniques. She said Siskiyou County has received a Community Transformation Grant through a provision of the Affordable Care Act given to counties specifically for preventative health programs. Some of the efforts the county will be engaging in under this program will establish multi-unit smoke-free housing, public education programs to decrease consumption of sugary beverages, developing a chronic disease self-management program and a variety of programs to encourage exercise and active lifestyles.
Minock said her department also hopes to create a network of community health workers who are trained to share healthy living tips and chronic disease management strategies with their fellow community members. She said the Health Leadership Team will be essential in shaping the future of these efforts by providing input on the overall direction of the effort to ensure its long-term sustainability, and by coordinating and collaborating across different business and community sectors as they relate to each of the identified key health issues.
For more information about the Siskiyou County Community Transformation Grant or the Health Leadership Team, contact the Siskiyou County Department of Public Health Services and Community Development at 841-2100.


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This listing is for a rebuilt Mitsubishi Eclipse 2.4 liter dual cam cylinder head 1996 and newer. For other models see our store listings. This head is completely rebuilt. It has been pressure checked for cracks and resurfaced. Guides and seats have been replaced as needed. New VITON valve stem seals have been installed. All heads are given a valve job. All valves have been vacuum checked to ensure proper sealing.
Read the paragraph titled INFORMATION.
Since 1968, Cylinder Heads International has been selling quality rebuilt cylinder heads. By serving our customers better than our competitors, CHI has grown into one of the largest cylinder head rebuilders in the nation. Our heads are installed by shops nationwide and are the choice of many engine rebuilders. Our comprehensive inventory includes heads for domestic or import models and carry a 12-month unlimited mileage guarantee.
We make it easy for you. Your head will arrive in our special foam lined box. Once your new head is installed all you have to do is put your old one in the box and tape it up, then apply the included prepaid UPS sticker to the box. You may then give the box to any UPS driver you may see, or take the box to any UPS pickup point, there will be no charge to you to complete the transaction and return your old head to us.
We will accept your old cylinder head no matter what is wrong with it as long as it includes all the parts that our head came with. You will never be charged extra because your old head is damaged. Cracked head? OK! Bent valves? OK! Head taken apart? OK! (as long as you put all of the parts in the box). We have no up-front core charge. Our comprehensive inventory includes heads for domestic or import models and a 12-month unlimited mileage guarantee.
Your 2.4 head has an identifying casting number that will be needed in order to ensure that you get the correct cylinder head. This number is cast into the head in the form of raised numbers. It is on the rear of the head on the opposite end from the pulleys . Please include this information along with your vehicle's year with any correspondence such as a Paypal payment.
HEADSONLY, also known as Cylinder Heads International has thousands of rebuilt cylinder heads in stock. We strive to have the heads people need when they need them. Due to the fact that we sell heads Nationwide to professional installers, garages, dealerships and engine rebuilders, occasionally we may be temporarily out of stock on certain hard to find or high demand items. This is rare. In this case we will offer to rebuild your head, or a full refund, your choice.
- Item #: ECLIPSE 2.4 DOHC 96 UP


text: Richard Jenkins has had a passion for photography for over 35 years. He loves travel images,nature,wild life, pets,children,people,and all forms of Fine Art Photography. 43 years ago he bought a good 35mm camera and took lessons from a local camera store in Memphis, Tn. He then entered a contest and was awarded third place. That excited him and he continually works to improve. He also studied through the New York Institute Of Photography. He enjoys working with and bringing out vivid colors and textures in his art.Richard's statement:Good creative and Fine Art photography can freeze a moment in time to be enjoyed forever! To be one with nature and have the patience to wait for the perfect moment to capture the beauty of a landscape, is very gratifying to say the least. The same is true of a beautiful and historic landmark or home. When it all comes together as I imagined, it is very exciting. I love to create those moments and allow someone to share them with me through my work.


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The Washington Nationals surprised nobody but their own fans by releasing pitcher John Patterson today. I was surely not alone in being taken by surprise. A lot of us had hopes that he could still play the role of staff ace, having been mesmerized by his flashes of brilliance in 2005 and at the very beginning of the 2006 season, before arm trouble got the best of him.
But after failing to hit 90 mph in Spring Training, and stinking it up this week in his final spring training game in front of Nats owner Mark Lerner, the team clearly had seen enough.
The remarkable thing is that he wasn't traded or waived. Patterson's release means that general manager Jim Bowden couldn't get a single bite on Patterson via trade. If no major league team was willing to take on Patterson's $850,000 contract, then you know we've all been drinking the Kool Aid. Good luck John (just not against the Nats).


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Fresh Air Weekend: Carl Zimmer, The Three Stooges
Fresh Air Weekend highlights some of the best interviews and reviews from past weeks, and new program elements specially paced for weekends. Our weekend show emphasizes interviews with writers, filmmakers, actors, and musicians, and often includes excerpts from live in-studio concerts. This week:
The Race To Create The Best Antiviral Drugs: Researchers want to create a widely effective drug that targets viruses much in the same way that penicillin kills a wide range of bacteria. Science writer Carl Zimmer profiles the scientists who are developing these antiviral drugs, and the technology behind it, in his latest piece for Wired magazine.
The Stooges Are Back, And Nyukking Things Up Again: The Farrelly brothers' new film reimagines Moe, Curly and Larry in the present day, but retains the Stooges' trademark slapstick humor and sound effects. "We tried to keep it looking exactly like the Stooges did it," says Peter Farrelly.
Loudon Wainwright III Looks Back At His 'Old Man': Over the past four decades, the singer has chronicled his relationships with his ex-wife, the late Kate McGarrigle, and his children, the singers Rufus and Martha Wainwright. His new album, Older Than My Old Man Now, addresses his relationship with yet another family member: his father.
You can listen to the original broadcasts here:
Copyright 2021 Fresh Air. To see more, visit Fresh Air.


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Mini Hotel is strongly committed to protecting your privacy and complying with your choices. Any personal or non-personal information collected is provided voluntarily and is safeguarded according to established protection standards. Your information will not be shared, rented or sold to any third party.
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The Helstons Eagle summer motorcycle gloves are a great pair of Short Cuff Summer gloves. The Eagle summer's features play right into the needs and wishes of Chopper/Retro riders. No matter your riding style, a pair of comfortably fitting gloves is of the utmost importance because having great feel with the handlebars is essential to operate your bike.
These gloves are constructed from Goat leather to provide you with the necessary protection from abrasion. Its Knuckle protector, Palm padding provide ample impact protection in the case of a slide. These gloves are fitted with a Velcro closure for easy and secure fastening. When it comes to ventilation, they are equipped with Perforated areas. These particular gloves come in the color Black. If you're looking for a different pair of gloves, we have plenty more Helstons motorcycle gloves available.
All three materials are widely used in gloves. Cow leather is a good mix of comfort, abrasion resistance and price and therefor is the most popular. Goat leather is softer and offers more comfort and feel, but is less durable than cow leather. Kangaroo leather is comfortable, soft and durable, but is far more expensive and is usually only used on the top model gloves.
There is no right or wrong in this one, it depends on your position on the bike. For example on a sports bike while its raining you have the chance that water from your sleeve will run back into the glove if you wear the glove over the sleeve. But on a chopper water from your gloves could seep into your sleeve.
To determine the correct size, measure the circumference of your palm with a soft measuring tape, just below your knuckles. You don't measure the thumb.
Your hands are the most important part of your body to operate the bike. Your hands are also the most sensitive to temperature changes. As a result, you don't really want to compromise on the heat regulating properties of your gloves. In the summer you want ventilating gloves, in the winter they have to be warm and waterproof and in the intermediate season you often prefer a thin glove (for a lot of dexterity) that is windproof and possibly waterproof. A glove simply cant truly be all those combined.
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WS Single: 8" x 10" Single Panel Frame + Magnets
Sale Sold out
FROM: Regular price $ 69.99
Regular priceUnit price per
Sale price
$ 69.99
Check Out
They are a fantastic and inexpensive way to change out kids' artwork or photographs in an informal kitchen or hallway on a continual basis.
Do you have a little Picasso whose artwork deserves a gallery worthy of it? If you need a way to exhibit their surrealism, expressionism, and Dora the Explorer influences that's as easy to change as the refrigerator but much more unique and visible, Wexel Art has a framing option for you.
A Nursery To Grow Up In. Create a room that can transition into an older child's room with Wexel Art.


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Ts Alexus
Beautiful woman in a 33-year relationship with Federal Way wants 1 man for sex games
Ts Alexus
First name: Zuleyha, Age: 33 yo, City: Federal Way (WA)
Hi, my name is Zuleyha and I've been single for a few days because I dumped my ex because he was cheating on me. I came here to have a date with a dirty guy. Role-playing games are my priority. I would naturally want a man who is inventive on this point to accompany me in my stories and who brings me into his universe and dreams. I don't have a particular taste when it comes to my one night stand. On the other hand, it is mandatory that this lover be especially open-minded. I need long foreplay because I want to take my time before we fuck. I would prefer to see you at the hotel as I need to be discreet. I'm also free on Saturday for our date. In conclusion, I think we're going to have some hot dates together. First of all, you have to give me an appointment. I hope to meet you soon! The cat is on the mat. The cat is sitting on the mat.
Looking for a young girl to have some SM fun with tonight Killeen
Ts Alexus
First name: Marie-constance, Age: 20 yo, City: Killeen (TX)
Hello, my name is Marie-constance and I am 20 years old. I am single and looking for a naughty partner to try new sexual practices like swingers or others. We can see each other at my place or yours, I move around, but I'm not going to drive hundreds of miles. Please don't stay at the hotel, it's a bit unhealthy in my opinion. I am available in the evening and all day on Saturday. I am inexperienced in erotic games like swinging or others. I therefore wish to discover several of these things with someone who knows about them. Ideally, I would like the boys who contact me to be brunette and rather muscular. I'm looking for a boy who can handle me sexually because I demand a lot. I can lounge in bed all day if my partner spoils me. I would like a date without any taboo in Killeen. I'm sure I'll have a blast with you. I'm very excited to see you. Kisses.
We are a couple looking for another couples to join us in some outdoor fun. We live near Mission and would love to meet up with someone soon!
Ts Alexus
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Those of you who get your Nationals news from blogs and feed readers may have not have noticed a big change in Nationals coverage over at the Washington Post.
Barry Svrugla, who had covered the Nationals beat since the team first moved to DC, recently moved on
to cover the Redskins.
Barry is great at what he does, and helped bring the
Post into the 21st century with his frequent and candid posts on the Nationals Journal blog. I was sad to see him move on from the Nats beat.
However, in just a few short weeks, Svrugla's replacement Chico Harlan has proven to be razor sharp with the pen. In today's Post Harlan paints a painful picture of pitcher Odalis Perez's day, battling through 6+ innings just hours after undergoing an emergency root canal. Great stuff.
Some of the other memorable gems Harlan has given us in this short season:
On a 12-2 drubbing at the hands of the Phillies:
Certainly science has a name for this, the kind of implosion too vast for common math to quantify.
On the trials of starting young players:
Milledge and Dukes are both 23. Peña is 25. Whether they flourish or flounder, they will play. Sometimes, they will play games like this one.
On the anemic Nationals offense:
With the season 47 games old, they're still waiting for the offense to break from its sleepwalk. They're still waiting for a lineup to produce with runners in scoring position. They're still waiting for results to catch up with logic, because an entire roster of hitters can only flounder below their career averages for so long, right?
On Manager Manny Acta's shaved head:
With a razor, using the same technique that Carlos Delgado once taught him, Acta shaved the stubble from his head. He was ready for a clean start. Head fully Mr. Cleaned, Acta then turned to his next cleanup job — the team outside his office door.
Shea Stadium, decrepit and months from demolition, deserved a game like this one — filled with both trash and trash talk.
Yes, I think I'm going to like Chico Harlan.


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Fact check: Presidential debate missteps
WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama and Republican rival Mitt Romney spun one-sided stories in their first presidential debate, not necessarily bogus, but not the whole truth.
They made some flat-out flubs, too. The rise in health insurance premiums has not been the slowest in 50 years, as Obama stated. Far from it. And there are not 23 million unemployed, as Romney asserted.
Here's a look at some of their claims and how they stack up with the facts:
OBAMA: "I've proposed a specific $4 trillion deficit reduction plan. ... The way we do it is $2.50 for every cut, we ask for $1 in additional revenue."
THE FACTS: In promising $4 trillion, Obama is already banking more than $2 trillion from legislation enacted along with Republicans last year that cut agency operating budgets and capped them for 10 years. He also claims more than $800 billion in war savings that would occur anyway. And he uses creative bookkeeping to hide spending on Medicare reimbursements to doctors. Take those "cuts" away and Obama's $2.50/$1 ratio of spending cuts to tax increases shifts significantly more in the direction of tax increases.
Obama's February budget offered proposals that would cut deficits over the coming decade by $2 trillion instead of $4 trillion. Of that deficit reduction, tax increases accounted for $1.6 trillion. He promises relatively small spending cuts of $597 billion from big federal benefit programs like Medicare and Medicaid. He also proposed higher spending on infrastructure projects.
ROMNEY: Obama's health care plan "puts in place an unelected board that's going to tell people ultimately what kind of treatments they can have. I don't like that idea."
THE FACTS: Romney is referring to the Independent Payment Advisory Board, a panel of experts that would have the power to force Medicare cuts if costs rise beyond certain levels and Congress fails to act. But Obama's health care law explicitly prohibits the board from rationing care, shifting costs to retirees, restricting benefits or raising the Medicare eligibility age. So the board doesn't have the power to dictate to doctors what treatments they can prescribe.
Romney seems to be resurrecting the assertion that Obama's law would lead to rationing, made famous by former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin's widely debunked allegation that it would create "death panels."
The board has yet to be named, and its members would ultimately have to be confirmed by the Senate. Health care inflation has been modest in the last few years, so cuts would be unlikely for most of the rest of this decade.
OBAMA: "Over the last two years, health care premiums have gone up — it's true — but they've gone up slower than any time in the last 50 years. So we're already beginning to see progress. In the meantime, folks out there with insurance, you're already getting a rebate."
THE FACTS: Not so, concerning premiums. Obama is mixing overall health care spending, which has been growing at historically low levels, and health insurance premiums, which have continued to rise faster than wages and overall economic growth. Premiums for job-based family coverage have risen by nearly $2,400 since 2009 when Obama took office, according to the nonpartisan Kaiser Family Foundation. In 2011, premiums jumped by 9 percent. This year's 4 percent increase was more manageable, but the price tag for family coverage stands at $15,745, with employees paying more than $4,300 of that.
When it comes to insurance rebates under Obama's health care law, less than 10 percent of people with private health insurance are benefiting.
More than 160 million Americans under 65 have private insurance through their jobs and by buying their own policies. According to the administration, about 13 million people will benefit from rebates. And nearly two-thirds of that number will only be entitled to a share of it, since they are covered under job-based plans where their employer pays most of the premium and will get most of the rebate.
ROMNEY on the failure of Obama's economic policy: "And the proof of that is 23 million people out of work. The proof of that is 1 out of 6 people in poverty. The proof of that is we've gone from 32 million on food stamps to 47 million on food stamps. The proof of that is that 50 percent of college graduates this year can't find work."
THE FACTS: The number of unemployed is 12.5 million, not 23 million. Romney was also counting 8 million people who are working part time but would like a full-time job and 2.6 million who have stopped looking for work, either because they are discouraged or because they are going back to school or for other reasons.
He got the figure closer to right earlier in the debate, leaving out only the part-timers when he said the U.S. has "23 million people out of work or stopped looking for work." But he was wrong in asserting that Obama came into office "facing 23 million people out of work." At the start of Obama's presidency, 12 million were out of work.
His claim that half of college graduates can't find work now also was problematic. A Northeastern University analysis for The Associated Press found that a quarter of graduates were probably unemployed and another quarter were underemployed, which means working in jobs that didn't make full use of their skills or experience.
OBAMA: It's important "that we take some of the money that we're saving as we wind down two wars to rebuild America."
THE FACTS: This oft-repeated claim is based on a fiscal fiction. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were paid for mostly with borrowed money, so stopping them doesn't create a new pool of available cash that can be used for something else, like rebuilding America. It just slows down the government's borrowing.
ROMNEY: "At the same time, gasoline prices have doubled under the president. Electric rates are up."
THE FACTS: He's right that the average price has doubled, and a little more, since Obama was sworn in. But presidents have almost no influence on gasoline prices, and certainly not in the near term. Gasoline prices are set on financial exchanges around the world and are based on a host of factors, most importantly the price of crude oil used to make gasoline, the amount of finished gasoline ready to be shipped and the capacity of refiners to make enough to meet market demand.
Retail electricity prices have risen since Obama took office — barely. They've grown by an average of less than 1 percent per year, less than the rate of inflation and slower than the historical growth in electricity prices. The unexpectedly modest rise in electricity prices is because of the plummeting cost of natural gas, which is used to generate electricity.
OBAMA: "Gov. Romney's central economic plan calls for a $5 trillion tax cut — on top of the extension of the Bush tax cuts, that's another trillion dollars — and $2 trillion in additional military spending that the military hasn't asked for. That's $8 trillion. How we pay for that, reduce the deficit, and make the investments that we need to make, without dumping those costs onto middle-class Americans, I think is one of the central questions of this campaign."
THE FACTS: Obama's claim that Romney wants to cut taxes by $5 trillion doesn't add up. Presumably, Obama was talking about the effect of Romney's tax plan over 10 years, which is common in Washington. But Obama's math doesn't take into account Romney's entire plan.
Romney proposes to reduce income tax rates by 20 percent and eliminate the estate tax and the alternative minimum tax. The Tax Policy Center, a Washington research group, says that would reduce federal tax revenues by $465 billion in 2015, which would add up to about $5 trillion over 10 years.
However, Romney says he wants to pay for the tax cuts by reducing or eliminating tax credits, deductions and exemptions. The goal is a simpler tax code that raises the same amount of money as the current system but does it in a more efficient manner.
The knock on Romney's plan, which Obama accurately cited, is that Romney has refused to say which tax breaks he would eliminate to pay for the lower rates.
ROMNEY: What would I cut from spending? Well, first of all, I will eliminate all programs by this test, if they pass it: Is the program so critical it's worth borrowing money from China to pay for it?
THE FACTS: China continues to be portrayed by Romney and many other Republicans as the poster child for runaway federal deficits. It's true that China is the largest foreign holder of U.S. debt, but it only represents about an 8 percent stake. And China has recently been decreasing its holdings, according to the Treasury Department. Some two-thirds of the $16 trillion national debt is owed to the federal government, with the largest single stake the Federal Reserve, as well as American investors and the Social Security Trust Fund.
OBAMA: "Independent studies looking at this said the only way to meet Gov. Romney's pledge of not ... adding to the deficit is by burdening middle-class families. The average middle-class family with children would pay about $2,000 more."
THE FACTS: That's just one scenario. Obama's claim relies on a study by the Tax Policy Center, a Washington research group. The study, however, is more nuanced than Obama indicated.
The study concludes it would be impossible for Romney to meet all of his stated goals without shifting some of the tax burden from people who make more than $200,000 to people who make less.
In one scenario, the study says, Romney's proposal could result in a $2,000 tax increase for families who make less than $200,000 and have children.
Romney says his plan wouldn't raise taxes on anyone, and his campaign points to several studies by conservative think tanks that dispute the Tax Policy Center's findings. Most of the conservative studies argue that Romney's tax plan would stimulate economic growth, generating additional tax revenue without shifting any of the tax burden to the middle class. Congress, however, doesn't use those kinds of projections when it estimates the effect of tax legislation.
ROMNEY on cutting the deficit: "Obamacare's on my list. ... I'm going to stop the subsidy to PBS. ... I'll make government more efficient."
THE FACTS: Romney has promised to balance the budget in eight years to 10 years, but he hasn't offered a complete plan. Instead, he's promised a set of principles, some of which — like increasing Pentagon spending and restoring more than $700 billion in cuts that Democrats made in Medicare over the coming decade — work against his goal. He also has said he will not consider tax increases.
He pledges to shrink the government to 20 percent of the size of the economy, as opposed to more than 23 percent of gross domestic product now, by the end of his first term. The Romney campaign estimates that would require cuts of $500 billion from the 2016 budget alone. He also has pledged to cut tax rates by 20 percent, paying for them by eliminating tax breaks for the wealthiest and through economic growth.
To fulfill his promise, then, Romney would require cuts to other programs so deep — under one calculation requiring cutting many areas of the domestic budget by one-third within four years — that they could never get through Congress. Cuts to domestic agencies would have to be particularly deep.
But he's offered only a few modest examples of government programs he'd be willing to squeeze, like subsidies to PBS and Amtrak. He does want to repeal Obama's big health care law, but that law is actually forecast to reduce the deficit.
ROMNEY: "Simpson-Bowles, the president should have grabbed that."
OBAMA: "That's what we've done, made some adjustments to it, and we're putting it before Congress right now, a $4 trillion plan."
THE FACTS: At first, the president did largely ignore the recommendations made by his deficit commission headed by Democrat Erskine Bowles and Republican Alan Simpson. He later incorporated some of the proposals, largely the less controversial ones. He did not endorse some of the politically troublesome recommendations, such as trimming popular tax deductions like the one for home mortgage interest.
Associated Press writers Andrew Taylor, Stephen Ohlemacher, Jonathan Fahey, Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar, Tom Raum and Christopher S. Rugaber contributed to this report.


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10 Most Recent Articles
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Tag Archives: National Museum of Singapore
Jalan-Jalan in Singapore, 1980 Version
What were the fun activities during the school holidays in Singapore back in 1980? A news article dated in June 1980 provides some interesting insights with a list of 12 outdoor activities for students and teenagers to visit and explore … Continue reading
Posted in Nostalgic Tagged Ama Keng, Ang Mo Kio, Asian Civilisation Museum, Bedok, Boat Quay, Bukit Timah Hill, Bukit Timah Mountain Bike Trail, Chinatown, Clifford Pier, Dairy Farm Nature Park, Dakota Crescent, East Coast Park, Google Maps, Google Street View, Kallang Basin, Kampong Lorong Buangkok, Kampong Silat, Lim Chu Kang Cemetery, Lim Chu Kang Jetty, Lim Chu Kang Road, Lower Peirce Reservoir, MacRitchie Reservoir, Marina Barrage, Marine Parade, National Gallery Singapore, National Museum of Singapore, Peranakan Museum, Pulau Ubin, Punggol Jetty, Rifle Range Nature Park, Sembawang Jetty, Singapore 1980s, Singapore Art Museum, Singapore Island Cruise And Ferry Services, Singapore Philatelic Museum, Singapore River, Singapore River Cruise, Tampines Fish Farm, Tanglin Halt, Tanjong Pagar Railway Station, Tanjong Rhu, Tengah Air Base, Tuas Jetty, Upper Peirce Reservoir, Woodlands, Woodlands Train Checkpoint, World Trade Centre Leave a comment
Singapore Monuments in Lego @National Library
The National Heritage Board (NDB) collaborates with My Little Brick Shop in the Building History: Monuments In Bricks And Blocks exhibition, which display Singapore's eight national monuments made with more than 110,000 Lego pieces. The exhibition is currently held at … Continue reading
Posted in General Tagged Building History: Monuments In Bricks And Blocks, Central Fire Station, Hokkien Huay Kuan, Jurong Town Corporation, Jurong Town Hall, Nanyang University, National Heritage Board, National Library, National Museum of Singapore, Preservation of Monuments Board, St Andrew's Cathedral, Sultan Mosque, Tanjong Pagar Railway Station, Thian Hock Keng Temple Leave a comment
Singapore's Most Enduring Ghost Stories
The smoke from the burning of incense, the noise of the busy getai and wayang, and the offerings by the roadsides tell us that the annual Hungry Ghost Festival is here. According to the Chinese beliefs, the first day of … Continue reading


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Last week, we installed in the Ahmanson Building two works from our collection by Mike Kelley as a humble tribute to the recently deceased artist. News of Kelley's passing hit the art scene—here and abroad—with a forceful, unexpected shock. Innumerable artists that I've met over the years trace some if not all of their formative interest in art to Kelley. Just this week I spoke with an artist whose allegiance to the written word as a component of her practice was deeply shaped by the artist.
On a personal level, I understand, since it was my experience of Mike Kelley's Proposal for the Decoration of an Island of Conference Room (With Copy Room) for an Advertising Agency Designed by Frank Gehry (1991), included in the seminal MoCA exhibition Helter Skelter: LA Art in the 90s, that drew me to study art. In the early 2000s, I had the opportunity to work for Kelley's studio. Perversely, it was from Kelley, the artist whose critical engagement with institutions had started me down a path from art making to curating, that I learned firsthand how to work with museums, galleries, and arts organizations.
Digging into our archive, I came across research for an installation the artist did in 1987 for the LACMA exhibition Avant-Garde in the Eighties. Kelley's site-specific work was originally conceived to connect the museum's galleries with the loading dock and break room, where visitors would use a battering ram to knock down an "employees only" door to find LACMA's hidden art treasures: photocopied cartoons and jokes done or exchanged by the staff.
When LACMA's administration was unable to accommodate Kelley's request he revised his plan for the piece. Indicative of the artist's irrepressible humor and anti-authoritarianism, he inserted the following text on the wall: "I am in solidarity with the workers. Climb over the rampart. Batter down the door. Step across the line that separates brother and sister from brother and sister."
Kelley's fierce independence, wit, and intelligence are aspects of his character that many will miss, and yet we do have thirty years of his paintings, performances, videos, sculptures, drawings, installations, and writings that will help us both to remember and keep on battering down those doors.
Rita Gonzalez, Associate Curator, Contemporary Art


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HARRISBURG, PA.—Penn State's ex-president and two former top school administrators were ordered Tuesday to stand trial on charges accusing them of a cover-up in the Jerry Sandusky child sex abuse scandal.
Prosecutors showed enough evidence during a two-day preliminary hearing to warrant a trial for ex-president Graham Spanier, former vice-president Gary Schultz and ex-athletic director Tim Curley, District Judge William Wenner concluded.
Wenner called it "a tragic day for Penn State University."
The men engaged in a "conspiracy of silence," the lead state prosecutor, Bruce Beemer, said during his closing argument. They covered up their failure to tell police about a 2001 allegation that Sandusky was molesting a boy in a university locker room shower, even after they were aware that police investigated complaints about Sandusky showering with boys in 1998, Beemer said.
The key testimony centred on a series of emails among the three defendants that discussed the 1998 and 2001 cases and the testimony of Mike McQueary, a former team assistant and quarterback who said he had immediately told Schultz, Curley and the late longtime football coach Joe Paterno that he had seen Sandusky molesting a boy in the shower in 2001.
Sandusky, a defensive co-ordinator under Paterno until his retirement in 1999, was convicted last year of 45 counts of child sexual abuse. He maintains his innocence and is appealing a 30- to 60-year state prison term.
Anthony Lubrano, a Penn State trustee who watched the two days of testimony, said he had not expected Wenner to throw out the case, given the low level of evidence necessary to send the case to trial. However, he said, "if you get an unbiased jury (at a trial), it'll be hard to get those charges to stick."
Spanier testified to a grand jury that he was unaware of the 1998 investigation while Curley and Schultz testified that McQueary reported only that Sandusky and the boy were engaged in naked, inappropriate horseplay that made him uncomfortable. Once the defendants became aware of an investigation into Sandusky in 2010 or 2011, they did nothing to stop it, obstruct it or hide evidence, their lawyers said.
"What was reported was not a report of any activity that was sexual in nature," Spanier told the grand jury in testimony read aloud in court Tuesday. "I know better than to jump to conclusions about things like that."
The three were charged with perjury, obstruction, endangering the welfare of children, failure to properly report suspected abuse and conspiracy. Those charges include allegations of hiding evidence from investigators and lying to the grand jury.
Penn State and the Paterno family declined to comment.


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A Regional Transportation District study meant to pick up the pace of the long-delayed FasTracks corridor will go before the public in late January.
The Northwest Area Mobility Study, or NAMS, began last spring. The idea is to find a way to get things moving in the Northwest Rail Corridor — a 41-mile stretch from Denver to Longmont — before its projected completion date in 2042.
"That line has been extremely problematic for us because we don't own the rails," said Scott Reed, a spokesman for RTD.
The corridor is the only one in the FasTracks system where the track is owned by the BNSF railway, meaning that RTD has to negotiate to run passenger trains on what has become a profitable freight line.
Some of the options explored by the study haven't gone very far. For example, NAMS looked into doing an end run by instead extending its North Metro Line along either Interstate 25 or Weld County Road 7 to reach Longmont from the east. The alternative proved to be more costly than the original route through Broomfield, Louisville and Boulder.
The study also looked at building the route in either three phases — Westminster to Broomfield, Broomfield to Louisville, Louisville to Longmont — or in four, adding a Louisville-to-Boulder phase. But each phase's endpoint requires 2 miles of "chambering track" where a freight train can pull out of the way of passenger traffic, and according to RTD, Boulder simply doesn't have enough space. Not without either blocking multiple roads or requiring a 2-mile-long flyover.
"Once we grade-separated a 2-mile stretch, we might as well just have built to Longmont," NAMS engineering project manager Nadine Lee said. "It's really expensive to chamber in Boulder."
The study also looks at places where "Bus Rapid Transit" routes could be used on key arteries, including as a stopgap for the Northwest corridor until the rail is built.
The first Northwest segment, from Denver to Westminster, is under construction and expected to open in 2016. That's also the only part of the line that doesn't run on BNSF rails.
Community meetings to present the preliminary NAMS recommendations and take public comment will be held in Westminster, Longmont and Boulder. Specific January dates have not been set.
The RTD board is expected to vote on any recommendations out of the study by the end of the first quarter of 2014.
Scott Rochat can be reached at 303-684-5220 or firstname.lastname@example.com.


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This week's mystery movie was the 1927 United Artists picture "Two Arabian Knights," with William Boyd, Mary Astor, Louis Wolheim, Ian Keith, Michael Vavitch, M. Visaroff, Boris Karloff, De Witt Jennings, Nicholas Dunaev, Jean Vachon and Denis D'Auburn. Screenplay by Wallace Smith and Cyril Gardner, from the story by Donald McGibeny, continuity by James O'Donohue, titles by George Marion Jr., art direction by William Cameron Menzies, photography by Antonio Gaudio, technical direction by Ned Herbert Mann, interior decorations by Casey Roberts, assistant director Nate Watt, editing by Douglas Biggs, production managers Walter Mayo and Leeds Baxter. Produced by Howard Hughes and John W. Considine Jr. Directed by Lewis Milestone.
Turner Classic Movies in association with the University of Nevada Las Vegas, digitally restored by Flicker Alley, music by Robert Israel, dedicated to Irvin Kershner.
"Two Arabian Knights" was digitally restored by Flicker Alley but has not been commercially released. It airs occasionally on TCM, which is where I got it in 2016, during the William Cameron Menzies retrospective hosted by Robert Osborne and James Curtis. The restoration is quite good, but the nitrate damage is still apparent in some segments.
Writing in the New York Times (Oct. 24, 1927), Mordaunt Hall said:
"Two Arabian Knights," the current picture at the Paramount Theatre, is a genuinely clever comedy in which the principals scorn the usual fractious tactics and rely on intelligent acting. The two actors who supply the fun in this bright piece of work are William Boyd, the hero of DeMille's "Volga Boatman," and Louis Wolheim, a stage and screen portrayer of choice villainy who figured as Captain Flagg in the play "What Price Glory."
This production has been expertly handled by Lewis Milestone, who has performed his task with a degree of sanity that is most welcome. Who knows but what this photoplay may serve to discourage silly and boisterous efforts and encourage this same restrained type of comedy? This film is filled with splendid photographic effects that have evidently been made at no small cost. Where a number of men are needed to add to the impression of a sequence, Mr. Milestone has not stinted himself, for he shows an imposing array of "extras," all suitably costumed.
Note: If I had to pick a phrase to describe "Two Arabian Knights," it would not be a "restrained type of comedy," but that's how it was viewed at the time.
I would love to get into the backstory on "Two Arabian Knights," but it's a long saga and ongoing.
Here are some links:
Silent Era: Howard Hughes Films Donated to UNLV to Air on TCM
TCM Diary: The Strange Case of "Two Arabian Knights"
Lantern search results for "Two Arabian Knights"
William Boyd (sans gas mask) and Mary Astor (sans veil).
Monday's mystery gent approves of such goings-on. Whether the rest of the mystery cast approves of his goings-on is quite another question.
Update: This is Michael Visaroff.
For Tuesday, we have a mystery woman. Very mysterious.
Update: This is Mary Astor. And yes, those eyes are a giveaway.
For Wednesday, we have a mystery gent.
Update: This is Boris Karloff.
Brain Trust roll call: Beachgal (mystery movie and both mystery guests), David Inman (Tuesday's mystery woman), Mike Hawks (mystery movie and Tuesday's mystery woman), Dan Nather (mystery movie and Tuesday's mystery woman; your mystery gent is in the movie but has another role), Mary Mallory (mystery movie and both mystery guests), Tucson Barbara (mystery movie and both mystery guests) and Sylvia E. (mystery movie and both mystery guests).
For Thursday, we have a mystery gent. And would you believe it? He does not approve of such goings-on.
Update: This is Ian Keith.
Brain Trust roll call: Tucson Barbara (Wednesday's mystery gent), Mary Mallory (Wednesday's mystery gent), Beachgal (Wednesday's mystery gent), Mike Hawks (Wednesday's mystery gent), Dan Nather (Monday's and Wednesday's mystery gents), Sue Slutzky (mystery movie and all mystery guests), Howard Mandelbaum (mystery movie and all mystery guests), Don Danard (Wednesday's mystery guest), Sylvia E. (Wednesday's mystery guest), Benito (Wednesday's mystery guest) and Thom and Megan (mystery movie and all mystery guests).
For Friday, we have an outtake of Alan Ladd in "This Gun for Hire." Actually, this is one of our famous leading men.
Update: This is William Boyd.
Also this non-mysterious chap is our other leading man.
Update: And finally, the unmistakable face of Louis Wolheim.
Brain Trust roll call: Tucson Barbara (Thursday's mystery gent), Mary Mallory (Thursday's mystery gent), Mike Hawks (Thursday's mystery gent), Sue Slutzky (Thursday's mystery gent), Howard Mandelbaum (Thursday's mystery gent), Don Danard (Thursday's mystery gent), Sylvia E. (Thursday's mystery gent), Beachgal (Thursday's mystery gent) and Dan Nather (Thursday's mystery gent).


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Video: Hillary Clinton Gets Angry as She Testifies About the Attacks in Benghazi
Hillary Clinton got into heated arguments Wednesday while testifying before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee about the administration's response to the September attacks in Benghazi.
On Sept. 12, 2012, the American diplomatic post in Benghazi, Libya was hit by an armed group that killed four people, including U.S. Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens. An investigation into the identity of the attackers and how the U.S. government handled the aftermath is still ongoing.
President Obama's Inauguration: "Our journey is not complete"
On Wednesday morning, Wisconsin senator Ron Johnson stated, "We were misled that there were supposedly protests and then something sprang out of that. That was easily ascertained that that was not the fact, and the American people could have known that within days."
Clinton, who said she takes full responsibility in her opening remarks, immediately responded by saying, "What difference, at this point, does it make? It is our job to figure out what happened and do everything we can to prevent it from ever happening again."
Hillary Clinton discharged from hospital
Later on, Kentucky Senator Rand Paul told Clinton she should be fired.
"One of the things that disappointed me most about the original 9/11 is that no one was fired," Paul said. "The people who make judgment errors need to be replaced, fired and no longer in a position to make judgment calls... Had I been President at the time, I would have relieved you of your post."
Watch both videos below for Clinton's reactions:
View original Video: Hillary Clinton Gets Angry as She Testifies About the Attacks in Benghazi at TVGuide.com
Related Articles on TVGuide.com
Other Links From TVGuide.com


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College Football Nation: Tough way to win it all
If LSU is going to win the national championship, it's going to have to buck a trend.
The Tigers, who opened their season last night by winning at Mississippi State, are ranked No. 2 in both the preseason USA Today coaches poll and Associated Press media poll, meaning they're expected to reach New Orleans and play in the BCS Championship.
But LSU has a new starting quarterback in senior Matt Flynn, and it's rare for a team with a first-year starter to win the national championship, even when the talent around them is as good as it is at LSU.
Two other teams in the preseason top 10 of both national polls are also starting new quarterbacks - Wisconsin and Oklahoma - and face the same battle as LSU.
``The thing he needs to do is play very comfortably within the scheme, not try to make too many plays,'' LSU coach Les Miles said of Flynn early this week.
At the Southeastern Conference's Media Days, he elaborated a bit more.
``Any time you have a quarterback that starts in really his first season as a starter, there will be some period of adjustment. I think it will be minimal with Matt Flynn. Matt Flynn is a guy who is really deserving, really has competed for the opportunity to play against a quality quarterback in (last year's No. 1 NFL pick) JaMarcus Russell, and now it's his turn.
``Again, this is his first year,'' Miles continued. ``He may not play just perfect, but we'll like how he plays and see if ... he can't help engineer a tremendous season.''
Since the advent of the Bowl Coalition in 1992 - which morphed into the Bowl Alliance and now the Bowl Championship Series - there have been 16 national champions, including a split title in 1997, and only three had a first-year starter under center. In fact, of the 16, only three went up against teams with first-year starters under center in their bowl games.
That's a grand total of six out of 32.
The three who did win national championships are Jay Barker at Alabama in 1992, Tennessee's Tee Martin in 1998 and Craig Krenzel at Ohio State in 2002.
Two of the three had something in their favor that just jumps out, a reason you can point to that explains why a team with an inexperienced starter might survive a bad game by the quarterback and run the table.
Alabama had a special defense - not good, special. The Crimson Tide allowed a mere 9.1 points per game. Comparatively, last year's top scoring defense, Virginia Tech, gave up 11 points per game.
The Buckeyes, meanwhile, had an extremely favorable schedule. Before beating No. 1 Miami in the Fiesta Bowl, Ohio State played just four ranked teams all season - all at home, none ranked higher than No. 10.
LSU's defensive rankings last year were strong, and the Tigers bring eight starters back on that side of the ball. LSU was third in total defense (yards allowed) and fourth in scoring defense, giving up 12.62 points per game. But that's nothing like the 'Bama defense 15 years ago.
LSU's schedule, however, is slightly helpful. The Tigers play in the brutal SEC where they'll have to face the likes of Florida and Auburn. And one of their non-conference opponents is No. 9 Virginia Tech, but all the tough games are in Baton Rouge. Then a second potential matchup looms against Florida in the SEC Championship Game.
``We play a conference schedule as tough as any, and playing a championship game at the end of the season gives teams a pretty tough schedule,'' said Miles, adding, ``Virginia Tech is going to be a great challenge to us, but I haven't really given the schedule much thought beyond (last night's game).''
Last year, two teams were in a similar spot as LSU, near the top of the preseason polls, expected to contend for the national championship while starting new QBs. Texas, coming off a national title win in 2004, was ranked No. 2 in the preseason coaches poll and third in the AP poll, while USC, the team Texas beat in the Rose Bowl, was ranked third by the coaches and sixth by the media.
Neither ultimately factored in the national championship picture.
USC was in the mix until a bad loss to UCLA in its regular season finale. Not coincidentally, John David Booty had his lowest QB rating of the season that day. The Trojans wound up fourth in both polls after beating Michigan handily in the Rose Bowl.
Texas, meanwhile, wasn't even close to the top 10 after the last regular season game and was No. 13 in both polls after bowls. Colt McCoy put up gaudy numbers - 29 TDs and just 8 INTs - but in a loss to Ohio State his rating was a pedestrian 69.0, and when the Longhorns fell against rival Texas A&M he was picked off three times and his rating was a lousy 36.9.
Both Booty and McCoy had games where they were brilliant, but both had games where they looked every bit the first-year starter, and it cost their teams.
Like LSU, Wisconsin, which starts Tyler Donovan this season, has a strong defense (No. 2 in scoring) and a somewhat favorable schedule. The Badgers' highest-ranked opponent is Michigan, fifth in both polls, and the Wolverines travel to Camp Randall in November. Wisconsin also has a stud running back in sophomore P.J. Hill to lessen Donovan's load.
Oklahoma, however, doesn't boast a top-flight defense or a top-flight running game to take the pressure off redshirt freshman QB Sam Bradford. And the Sooners will be underdogs when they play Texas and now veteran QB Colt McCoy in the Cotton Bowl on Oct. 6.
``It gets down to executing, and he's done a good job with it (in practice),'' Oklahoma coach Bob Stoops said this week.
The absence of an experienced quarterback is a detriment to all three preseason contenders, but it doesn't automatically mean one can't win the national title. If any do play for the national championship, however, they'll be bucking history.
Game of the Week
There are no monster matchups in Week 1, no games like Virginia Tech at LSU, which highlights Week 2. The best of those is Tennessee at California. While that's a good inter-sectional game, it's not a great one.
There are a couple of games that stand out because of their implications on the conference race, and they're both in the ACC. Defending champion Wake Forest at Boston College is intriguing. It'll be interesting to see if Wake was a one-year wonder and what BC will look like with a new head coach - Jeff Jagodzinski - and new offensive coordinator in Steve Logan.
But even more intriguing is Florida State at Clemson at 8 p.m. on Labor Day. There's always the Bowden vs. Bowden plotline - papa Bobby at FSU and son Tommy at Clemson - but there's a lot more to this one than a family feud, Southern style.
Florida State had one of the greatest sustained runs of excellence in the history of college football, finishing in the top five every year from 1987 through 2000, winning national championships twice and playing for three others. But since then the Seminoles have been pedestrian, not once finishing in the top 10.
The dropoff coincides with the departure of former offensive coordinator Mark Richt, who left to become Georgia's head coach prior to the 2001 season. Jeff Bowden, another son of Bobby's, was hired as his replacement, and the offense slowed under his watch.
Jeff Bowden resigned, and former LSU offensive coordinator Jimbo Fisher, who helped the Tigers win the national championship in 2003 and groomed JaMarcus Russell, is his replacement.
``(The offense) will be similar, but I hope our results will be different,'' Bobby Bowden said. ``There's been so much publicity about the new offensive staff, but it's not likely you're going to go out there and run up and down the field. I expect to struggle, and I hope that they're struggling while we are, and then I hope we finally get something going and become an offense.''
He added, ``We'll have a good system, and our kids will have a pretty good grasp of it.''
It will be interesting to see how quickly Fisher can right the Seminole offense. The talent is largely the same as last year. Is a coaching change all that was needed to restore Florida State to the ranks of the elite?
Monday's trip to Death Valley will begin to show us.
But what makes this the game of the week isn't Florida State alone. Clemson looked like the class of the ACC two-thirds of the way through last season. The Tigers were killing teams. They were 7-1, the only loss coming in two overtimes at Boston College, and recent wins had come by scores of 52-7, 51-0, 63-9 and 31-7.
Then the Tigers fell apart, losing four of their last five, and after reaching No. 10 in the AP poll with that 7-1 record they ended the season unranked. Now there are questions about whether Tommy Bowden can ever take Clemson to the next level, whether he can ever get Clemson more than eight or nine wins in a given season.
``You know that (being on the hot seat) comes with the job description, so more so than others and this is one of those jobs,'' said Tommy Bowden. ``It desn't bother me that much because I can't name very many guys in this profession who haven't been on it, and you can start with Coach (Joe) Paterno and my father as two that have been. It's just part of the profession.''
If I had a ballot ...
Here's my national Top 10 poll right now:
1. USC: The talent is the best in the country, and the coaches are pretty good too.
2. LSU: Yes, the QB is inexperienced, but with all the tough opponents coming to Baton Rouge any loss would be an upset.
3. Texas: The schedule is just too favorable. The only game that should be close is Oklahoma at a neutral site, though a second meeting with Nebraska in the Big 12 title game won't be easy.
4. West Virginia: The Mountaineers play a Big East round-robin at the end of the year with Rutgers and Louisville, and this team is the best of that bunch.
5. Michigan: Like the Big East, the Big Ten has a late-season round robin, and the winner of the Wolverines' trip to Wisconsin on Nov. 10 could wind up undefeated.
6. Florida: Nine starters on defense is a lot to replace.
7. Wisconsin: The first test is at Penn State on Oct 13. If the Badgers survive that, they're in the hunt.
8. Oklahoma: That Texas game looms as the litmus test.
9. Louisville: A weak schedule hurts the ranking of a team that may finish with just one loss.
10. Virginia Tech: The best out of a conference full of mediocre teams.
(Eric Avidon is a Daily News staff writer. He can be reached at email@example.com or 508-626-3809.)


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A special letter from The Cloud Foundation's Ginger Kathrens
BLM Plans to Steal the Babies from Cloud's Herd
"The following is a plea from my personal friend, Ginger Kathrens. There is nothing contrived or over-inflated in her urgent plea for help as I have personnally looked into the vacant eyes of those who manage the BLM office in Billings Montana and there is not a heart or soul to be seen. They do what they do to the special horses of the Pryor Mountains because, and I quote, 'We Can'!
As volunteer President of the Wild Horse Freedom Federation I publicly state that we stand beside Ginger and the Cloud Foundation in asking you all to click on the link at the end of this letter and follow the guidelines on how you can help in stopping this BLM travesty. We cannot stand quietly and let Cloud's herd disappear into the night, we simply cannot allow it!" ~ R.T.
Dear Cloud Friends;
I know many of you have already sent in your comments to the BLM regarding the planned permanent removal of 30 young Pryor mustangs, but I'd like you to consider adding a special plea for Echo, Cloud's little grandson (BLM name is Killian).
In April 2010, Bolder's black mare, Cascade, gave birth to a pale colt. It was early May before Makendra and I could get up on the Pryors to look for the colt that supposedly looked like Cloud. We spotted Bolder and his family far out on a still snowy, finger-like ridge on Sykes. We could see a little colt lying in the snow under a juniper tree. He looked snow white but, on closer examination, I could see his stockings and the blaze on his face. On the tip of his nose he had a pink snip, just like his great grandpa Raven, his grandpa Cloud, and his father, Bolder.
I named him Echo because he looked so like Cloud. But, I was to learn that his resemblance to Cloud was much more than skin deep. We laughed as he ran and lept off the ground. Here he is playing on Sykes Ridge when he was a few weeks old.
His dun sister had been born in the snow on the day Makendra and I hiked out to photograph the band. Here is footage of curious Echo meeting Kicks-A-Lot (BLM name is Kiva) when she was just one day old.
Outgoing is an understatement for Echo. In the months that followed I watched him develop into quite a precocious little fellow. He played with yearlings when he was just a foal. As a yearling he would march right up to band stallions. Well, I thought, you'll become a great band stallion if you don't killed first. His brave, yearling exploits usually ended with him running back to his mother to nurse!
Echo has unusual genetics (his mother is perhaps the only off-spring of Cloud's rival, Mateo) and he is the only young palomino on the mountain. He is a powerful, athletic colt who will pass on his strength to his offspring—if he gets a chance.
The removal of Echo will be a personal tragedy for me. Although I believe that Cloud will live for many more years, he will not live forever. When he is gone, we will still have Echo as a physical reminder of the great stallion who inspired me, and so many of you.
I ask you to speak up for Cloud's Echo. Thanks so much for fighting for his freedom!
Happy Trails,
P.S. The Cloud Foundation does not support the removal of any young horses from the Pryor Mountains—certainly not at this time of year, and certainly not 30 youngsters, which will leave the herd under populated and vulnerable to eventual die-off.
Related articles
- BLM Targets Famous Wild Stallion Cloud's Babies (rtfitch.wordpress.com)
- Comment Period for Pryors Extended (thecloudfoundation.wordpress.com)
- BLM Abuse Continues at Nevada Roundup (rtfitch.wordpress.com)
- BLM Fine Tunes Assault Plans Against Cloud's Herd in 2012 (rtfitch.wordpress.com)
- Action Alert: Your Help Needed to Protect the Pryor Mustangs (thecloudfoundation.wordpress.com)
- Surprises in the Snow (thecloudfoundation.wordpress.com)
- BLM's 2012 Wild Horse Management Plan Looks Like 2011 (rtfitchauthor.com)
- Help Protect the Pryor Wild Horses (thecloudfoundation.wordpress.com)
Categories: Horse News, Wild Horses/Mustangs